June 9, 2010

Pain vs. pleasure or happiness vs. fear...  What motivates you?  or more precisely... 'how" are you motivated?
Test:  What speaks louder to you?  I'm going to give you a thousand bucks if you do this, or I'm going to take a thousand bucks from you if you don't do this.  Are you motivated to do whatever it is by the pleasure of receiving money or the pain of having to give it up?
Deciding the answer to this question will help you better manage your life and your business.  I think everyone tends to be motivated (to a large degree) by either pain or pleasure.  Different situations may bring about different motivating factors, but I think each of us works from a certain perspective.  Understanding what motivates you is key to your success.

Let's use exercise as an example:

"The Work-Out Addict" - This person LOVES the endorphin rush and finds pleasure in working out.  They do it ALL the time. - This person is motivated by pleasure.
"The Extreme Couch Potato" - This person hates, HATES, HATES to work out and associates all kinds of pain with it. They avoid it at ALL costs. - This person is motivated by pain.

Now, these are two extreme examples.  Not everyone is that extreme.  What about the people in the middle?  Maybe you're more like them.  Here are two more examples:

"The Wanna-Be" - This person doesn't necessarily enjoy working out, but does enjoy the benefits that he or she receives from it... endorphins, health, better looking body, etc.  This person just gets it over with so that they can experience the rewards.  They are motivated by pleasure.
"The HAVE-to-Be" - This person doesn't enjoy working out either, but because of the fear of pain (illness, even death) they exercise.  They are motivated by pain... or the fear of it.

So you might be saying, "Who cares!  What does this have to do with me or my business?"  Good question.  Listen... how many times do we say to ourselves... "Why do I ALWAYS do that?!?"  (Whatever that is)  It doesn't matter which is your motivator.  One is not better than the other.  What matters is that you recognize it, stay aware of it and manage it accordingly.  Knowing what motivates you can help you to recognize why you aren't as successful as you'd like to be in certain areas of your business.  Once you know why that tends to be a problem, you can take steps to overcome your natural tendencies and become more productive.

Anthony Robbins sums it up this way, "The secret of success is learning how to use pain and pleasure instead of having pain and pleasure use you. If you do that, you're in control of your life. If you don't, life controls you."